Payments for Environmental Services What have we learned so far? 1

Luca Tacconi

1based on the project “Assessing the livelihood impacts of incentive payments for avoided deforestation” (Tacconi, Mahanty & Suich with AusAID support)

Defining PES

REDD and payments for environmental services

REDD involves payments to developing countries for certified reductions in carbon emissions arising from their actions to reduce deforestation and forest degradation

PES is a possible mechanism to link national and sub-national activities and redistribute national level income from REDD

Why consider local impacts?

key concerns amongst community/indigenous rights advocates: Recentralisation of

forest rights Benefit capture by elites Inequitable/negative

social impacts Photo: UNDP Philippines (SGP-PTF)

Key questions

What have been the livelihood impacts of existing PES schemes?Financial, social, human, physical,

natural capital

What are the implications for the design of REDD activities?

Photo: Rowena Soriaga

Case studies[SM1]Need to order this table alphabetical by country or author

Country PES Project (author)Brazil* Proambiente (Bartels)Global GEF portfolio review (Haskett/Gutman)Indonesia* Cidinau watershed PES scheme (Beria)Mexico* Carbon Forestry Payments Programme (Corbera)Mozambique Nhambita Carbon Community Project (Jindal)Nicaragua & Colombia

Regional Integrated Silvopastoral Ecosystem Management Project (Rios/Pagiola)

Philippines* 'No fire bonus' scheme, Cordillera, Northern Luzon (Soriaga)

Uganda Trees for Global Benefits Programme (German)Zimbabwe* CAMPFIRE (Chirozva)

* Country ranked amongst the top 20 deforesting countries by FAO (2006).

Access to PES schemes

Findings: Participation by

poor households possible

But often hampered by tenure, labour, capital needs, transaction costs

Scope to broaden access to REDD through:

• Collective contracts • Schemes that don’t

require title to forest lands

• Strengthening/ recognising local rights

Financial and physical capital

Findings: Individual payments =

small % of household income

Collective payments invested in infrastructure, services

Payments don’t reflect opportunity cost

Payment timing

Implications for REDD: Look beyond household to

community level agreements/ benefits for non-private forests

Better understanding of/link to opportunity costs

Coherence between commitment period and payment schedule

Social capital

Findings: Working with existing

community institutions strengthens: resource management & coordination capacity, external linkages

Scope for intra-household and community conflict –access, distribution

Implications for REDD: Build on existing community

institutions Attention to equity (access,

distribution) & conflict management

Natural capital

Findings: Weak evidence of change in

access to resources because case study projects on private or collectively owned land• Still a risk for public forests

given evidence of change where resources used informally

Weak monitoring of environmental outcomes

Implications for REDD:

Understand informal use of commons especially in non-private forests

Address appropriate scale, indicators in environmental monitoring

Human capital

Findings: Intermediaries facilitate

capacity building environmental awareness, land management, governance, business development, PES

Long term impacts not known

Implications for REDD:

Capacity building is key role for intermediaries

Concluding thoughts

Tenure and existing assets have been critical to access Most PES experience on private lands and some in

community lands For non-private forests, important to look beyond individual

households to collective agreements and benefits, role of existing community institutions

Sustainability will ultimately depend on whether benefits outweigh opportunity costs, timeframes